Don E. Curtis, an internationally known steel guitar player and a popular country musician in the St. Louis area, collapsed and died Wednesday (Sept. 29, 2010) while hiking with his girlfriend in a forest near Hot Springs, Ark.

He was 53 and lived in St. John.

The couple had started a vacation Sunday. About 1 p.m. Wednesday, they were walking near the end of a trail lined with pine trees when Mr. Curtis turned toward his girlfriend, Linda Rola of St. Louis County, and said: "I don't feel so well. I think I'm going to pass. ..."

Before he could finish, he tumbled down a hill.

Rola, a registered nurse, tried unsuccessfully to revive Mr. Curtis with help from four park rangers.

"According to the coroner, it was a massive heart attack," she said Friday.

Mr. Curtis was a regular at the International Steel Guitar Convention held each Labor Day at the Millennium Hotel downtown.

He performed at Stovall's Grove, a honky-tonk bar in Wildwood; Riddle's restaurant in the Delmar Loop; and the River City Casino in South County.

He played with the Missouri Valley Boys, the Commander Cody Band, Del Reeves, Bill Monroe and other artists and country western groups.

He won international awards for his performances and contributions to steel guitar playing. He produced seven CDs, wrote articles and published books on the steel guitar.

Some 750,000 people tuned in for his last Internet radio show, steelradio.com, said Michael Scott, the show's owner and producer.

During the day, Mr. Curtis could be found at Scotty's music store in Overland, where he was in charge of the steel guitar department. Nights, he played gigs three or four times a week.

Mr. Curtis was an expert at the pedal steel guitar, a type of electric guitar requiring dexterity, the use of a metal slide rather than fingers, and foot pedals and knee levers.

"It was such a joy to watch him play that instrument," Rola recalled. "He told me once that the steel guitar could come the closest of all instruments to the human voice. He could make it sound so sad, you could cry."

Mr. Curtis grew up in Indianapolis, where his father worked on an assembly line and was a balladeer, playing guitar and whistling and yodeling until an accident took fingers from his left hand.

According to Mr. Curtis' biography, he started playing music at age 5 when his parents gave him a cheap drum set.

He found he was unable to whistle or yodel, so he switched to the guitar, then the drums and finally the steel guitar.

At 11, his mother left him with his father and died eight months later. His father died seven years later. After high school, he studied music theory.

He married, divorced and moved to Nashville, Tenn., and then to St. Louis to pursue his music career.

He had a passion for playing music, listening to music, writing about music and teaching music.

Three years ago, while playing at Stovall's Grove, he met Rola, who was line dancing.

They took up hiking. She says he tried to live by the Golden Rule.

"He very rarely said 'no' to anyone," she said. "It didn't matter what he had going on, he would try to help you."

Survivors, in addition to Rola include a son, Don E. Curtis Jr.; a daughter, Melissa L. Curtis; a sister, Brenda L. Criss, all of Indianapolis; and two grandsons.

The funeral will be held Monday in Indianapolis. The family plans a memorial service in the St. Louis area within several weeks.